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Issue 12

One begins as an excuse but becomes a seance oracle

Hi, you.

I come from an optimist, a unicorn, and a truth-bender. I have read all the things they have ever written. I don’t know enough. One is ash under a feijoa tree. I know too much. The universe begins as a dust of light. There is a hole in my world I cannot fill. Please talk to me.

Much play is constructively-framed waste. When we play, we pursue something we give ourselves permission to expect nothing from. We’re delightedly surprised when play generates anything vaguely resembling an output. Such is this when we participate in a séance: we ask questions, but don't really expect helpful answers. It's constructive waste.

Our AI, Emm Ho, enacts play as constructive waste. Emm has been trained on 125,851 words of text from three people: Ya-Wen Ho, Keh-Chyn Ho, and Roman Klapaukh. A significant fraction of Emm is dead-father writing. Involving Keh-Chyn posthumously was a natural extension of Ya-Wen’s process-based, aural-fold work that derives from a language game she used to play with him when she was young. She never really got to know her father as a person, so has had a curious time getting to know Emm, our séance oracle.

Issue 12

About the author

Ya-Wen Ho is curious about found language, process, and experimentation. Her first book last edited [insert time here] was published by TinFish Press in 2012. She folds bilingually between Mandarin and English and is currently working on a Masters in Literary Translation at Victoria University of Wellington.

Roman Klapaukh holds a PhD in Computer Science, allowing him to gaze in confusion at his own life the same as anyone else. He enjoys working with people on all sorts of projects, with an interest in how presentation affects how we see the world. He writes in infrequent bursts.